Growing Old – A very touching poem

 

 

 

That was beautiful, Kathy. Thanks

 

I know I shouldn’t be saying this but there are mornings I wake up and realise I’m on the “wrong” side of forties (I used to think in terms of thirties), especially if I wake up to some aches or sores which prevent me from doing my morning runs, as this past week has been.

 

This poem reminds me to take things in the correct spirit and perspective.

 

Think I will blog this…

 

 

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 SOME GREAT WORDS OF WISDOM FROM LISA MORISON – well worth a read and  reflection.

When an old lady died in the geriatric ward of a small hospital near
Dundee, Scotland, it was believed that she had nothing left of any value.
Later, when the nurses were going through her meager possessions, they found this poem. Its quality and content so impressed the staff  that
copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital. One nurse took her copy to Ireland. The old lady’s sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas edition of the News Magazine of the North Ireland Association for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on her simple, but eloquent, poem. And this little old Scottish lady, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this "anonymous" poem winging across the Internet:

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  Crabby Old Woman

  What do you see, nurses?
  What do you see?
  What are you thinking
  When you’re looking at me?

  A crabby old woman,
  Not very wise,
  Uncertain of habit,
  With faraway eyes?

  Who dribbles her food
  And makes no reply
  When you say in a loud voice,
  "I do wish you’d try!"

  Who seems not to notice
  The things that you do,
  And forever is losing
  A stocking or shoe?

  Who, resisting or not,
  Lets you do as you will,
  With bathing and feeding,
  The long day to fill?

  Is that what you’re thinking?
  Is that what you see?
  Then open your eyes, nurse,
  You’re not looking at me.

  I’ll tell you who I am
  As I sit here so still,
  As I do at your bidding,
  As I eat at your will.

  I’m a small child of ten
  With a father and mother,
  Brothers and sisters,
  Who love one another.

  A young girl of sixteen
  With wings on her feet
  Dreaming that soon now
  A lover she’ll meet.

  A bride soon at twenty,
  My heart gives a leap,
  Remembering the vows
  That I promised to keep

  At twenty-five now,
  I have young of my own,
 Who need me to guide
  And a secure happy home.

  A woman of thirty,
  My young now grown fast,
  Bound to each other
  With ties that should last.

  At forty, my young sons
  Have grown and are gone,
  But my man’s beside me
  To see I don’t mourn.

  At fifty once more,
  Babies play round my knee,
 Again we know children,
 My loved one and me.

  Dark days are upon me,
  My husband is dead,
  I look at the future,
  I shudder with dread.

  For my young are all rearing
  Young of their own,
  And I think of the years
  And the love that I’ve known.

  I’m now an old woman
  And nature is cruel;
  ‘Tis jest to make old age
  Look like a fool.

  The body, it crumbles,
  Grace and vigour depart,
  There is now a stone
  Where I once had a heart.

  But inside this old carcass
  A young girl still dwells,
  And now and again,
  My battered heart swells.

  I remember the joys,
  I remember the pain,
  And I’m loving and living
  Life over again.

  I think of the years
  All too few, gone too fast,
  And accept the stark fact
 That nothing can last.

  So open your eyes, people,
  Open and see,
  Not a crabby old woman;
  Look closer . . . see ME!!

 Remember this poem when you next meet an old person who you might brush aside without looking at the young soul within………..we will all, one
 day, be there, too!